Originally Posted by
theprestige
But okay, whatever. We can still question why what happened in that video happened in that video. Why did it happen? Do you know?
Looks to me like he got angry but not violent or threatening, and the police decided this was sufficient justification to escalate the level of confrontation. It looks like classic "I am a cop and you will respect my authoritah!" behavior. Whether it would have happened if he'd been white is a question we can only speculate about. What I find interesting is that the family's lawyer is only pressing charges against the city concerning the injuries to his mother. My interpretation of this is that they don't see any prospect of finding a jury that could possibly find a police officer at fault for brutality against a tall, fit-looking black man, even though there's not even a vague indication that he was committing any crime or presenting a reasonable threat of committing one, but that maybe beating the crap out of a small 68-year-old woman is just a little bit beyond the pale. Again, I'm only speculating, and if other posters can offer examples of white shoppers being treated similarly I'd be glad to reconsider.
Dave